Celebrate World Meat-Free Week for a Healthy Planet and a Healthy You

It's World Meat-Free Week! People all over the world will celebrate by eating plant-based meals. And in communities around the world, people will come together to celebrate with delicious, healthy food.

Why World Meat-Free Week?

Intensive meat and dairy production is destroying our forests, polluting our water, and warming our planet. It is causing deforestation on a massive scale, with over a quarter of the Earth's landmass currently being used for livestock grazing! It is driving global warming: greenhouse gas emissions from livestock are equal to all emissions from cars, trucks and airplanes. And while many places are experiencing water shortages and droughts, livestock are the single largest consumer and polluter of water on the planet.

Changing our diets from meat-intensive to more plant-based alternatives is also essential to our health. High red meat consumption has been linked to cancer, heart disease, obesity and diabetes. Five million deaths each year could be avoided by 2050 if people all around the world shifted to healthier diets with more veggies and legumes and less meat.

But the good news is that there's something we can do about this. All over the world, people are taking action in their own lives and communities, by eating more veggies and less and better meat and encouraging their friends and family to do the same.

And on June 11, the first day of World Meat Free Week, people everywhere will stand up for healthy food and a healthy planet by choosing not to eat meat or dairy. Discover how you can get involved and sign up to join in.

Open Boat events consisting of several tents providing an opportunity for our visitors to engage with Greenpeace history, our local campaigns, global and local plastic issues, and cooking meat free meals.

An image of the trans-alaskan oil pipeline that carries oil from the northern part of Alaska all the way to valdez. This shot is right near the arctic national wildlife refuge. kyletperry / iStock / Getty Images Plus

The Trump administration has initialized the final steps to open up nearly 1.6 million acres of the protected Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge to allow oil and gas drilling.

A Florida man has been allowed to import a Tanzanian lion's skin, skull, claws and teeth, a first since the animal was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, according to US Fish and Wildlife Service records uncovered by the Center for Biological Diversity through the Freedom of Information Act.

A fracked natural gas well in northwest Louisiana has been burning for two weeks after suffering a blowout. A state official said the fire will likely burn for the next month before the flames can be brought under control by drilling a relief well.